3.12.2013

Following up with the theme of yesterday's post on Arcane / Spiritcraft, we wanted to get to something we've been thinking about for some time but really never followed through on - an aggro homebrew featuring blue / white Spirits. We first thought of a more control / mill version when we saw Return to Ravnica's Psychic Spiral which allows you to dump all the cards in your 'yard back into your library while milling your opponent the same number. To get there, we had contemplated using Gloom Surgeon and Mindshrieker along with other similar cards. Unfortunately, we did not move forward with this.

Yesterday on Gathering Magic, we had read with interest the article 'Tokens of Appreciation' by Mike Cannon. As we have a soft spot for tokens, we were keen to evaluate Mike's Esper Tokens list. Ever since Honor of the Pure rotated out of standard, white weenie and black / white tokens just did not have the same appeal and we were looking for a replacement. Mike's list has some lovely anthem effects with Drogskol Captain, Intangible Virtue and Favorable Winds. Here's our particular take on this, bent to our own individual tastes, the available cards in our collection and the local meta-game at our Friday Night Magic venue, OMG! Games, here in Barrie, Ontario.

4x Glacial Fortress3x Drowned Catacomb1x Moorland Haunt5x Island9x Plains~This is all about attempting to field as many flying spirit creatures onto the game table as possible in a short amount of time as games which run longer will likely end in a frown for this list. Doomed Traveller is our fav one-drop providing an earlier blocker and latter a spirit token. Thought Scour provides some limited card draw while dumping cards into the opponents graveyard to be targeted by Beckon Apparition, giving you another spirit token.

A full book set of Lingering Souls and Midnight Haunting provide the fuel for the aggro fire here on turn three or we have the option of dropping a Geist of Saint Traft, where benefits may be provided either to himself, the 4/4 Angel token he generates or to both.

After turn three, we will welcome either a Geist-Honored monk and the two spirits that this card brings along or perhaps a miracle Entreat the Angels which hopefully by that time are finishing the game for us with several 6/6 flying / vigilance tokens.

We've not completely dismissed our earlier iterations using a mill strategy and will likely get a few more cards from MTG Mint Card to complete a list and give it a spin.~